Rape, kidnap of tourists feed Rio safety fears

Suspects Wallace Aparecido Souza Silva, left, Carlos Armando Costa dos Santos, center, and Jonathan Foudakis de Souza are presented to the press at the Special Police Unit for Tourism Support (DEAT) after being arrested for allegedly attacking tourists in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Tuesday, April 2, 2013. An American woman was gang raped and beaten aboard a public transport van while her French boyfriend was shackled, hit with a crowbar and forced to watch the attacks after the pair boarded the veh
— AP

Suspects Wallace Aparecido Souza Silva, left, Carlos Armando Costa dos Santos, center, and Jonathan Foudakis de Souza are presented to the press at the Special Police Unit for Tourism Support (DEAT) after being arrested for allegedly attacking tourists in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Tuesday, April 2, 2013. An American woman was gang raped and beaten aboard a public transport van while her French boyfriend was shackled, hit with a crowbar and forced to watch the attacks after the pair boarded the veh
/ AP

Some six hours after they were kidnapped, the two were dumped by the side of a highway near the city of Itaborai, some 50 kilometers from Rio. They managed to make it to an unidentified country's consulate, where officials took the two to the special police delegation that specializes in crimes against foreigners. The young woman has returned to the U.S., while the man remains in Rio to help with the investigations, Braga said.

"The victims recognized the three without a shadow of a doubt," Braga said. The men's mug shots were also recognized by another woman who said she'd been raped by the three under similar circumstances last month. Another foreigner has said she'd been robbed by one of the three suspects, police said.

Two of the suspects have confessed to Saturday's attack, while the third denies any responsibility.

"They do not show any repentance," Braga said. "They are quite indifferent, cold."

He said the men appeared to work as legitimate van operators, with crime an occasional side venture. Though they apparently were authorized to transport passengers in Niteroi and neighboring Sao Goncalo, the suspects were not allowed to operate the van in Rio, he said.

The suspects allegedly had rented the van, which seats about a dozen people and has dark tinted windows, from the vehicle's owner, who police say is not suspected of any involvement in the crime.

Rio's van services are widely reviled for their precarious safety conditions and reckless driving, as well as their links to organized crime. Some vans are run by militias largely composed of former police and firemen who control large swaths of the city's slums and run clandestine transportation and other services. In general, tourists avoid the vans and opt for regular buses or taxis.

Sexual assaults remain a problem on public transit. Last year, a woman was raped on a moving bus in broad daylight in a widely publicized case, and the Rio subway has special women-only cars to help prevent such attacks.

Still, Brazilian officials emphasized Rio is not particularly prone to such attacks.

"I think sexual violence is something that can happen anywhere," said Aparecida Goncalves, Brazil's national secretary for violence against women. "I don't think that the city of Rio is more dangerous than others."

"Now we have more ways of denouncing them," she said, "of talking about and taking the necessary measures so those responsible are punished and imprisoned."

Walter Maierovitch, Brazil's former drug czar and an organized crime expert, said that with crime down overall, one of the city's main challenges will be making sure visitors remain vigilant and aware of basic safety precautions.

"There has been a lot of improvement in Rio but there is still a lot more to be done in terms of security, mainly more preventive actions, alerting tourists both foreign and domestic of the precautions they should take, neighborhoods to avoid," he said.